May 24, 2007 4:00 pm US/Eastern
3 On Your Side: Wine Trackers
by Jim Donovan
PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) ―
How would you like to keep track of what wine you keep stored at your house, which bottles taste best and be able to do that wherever you are?
3 On Your Side's Jim Donovan reports it's possible with new technology and shows you how.
Marc and Jessica levy love wine.
"Red wine, white wine. We also very much like French wine," Marc said.
They have a growing wine collection which they store in their basement. To keep track of their stock, the Levy's use a wine-tracking website.
"We use it for cataloging our wine so we know what we have. As we get more and more wine it's nice to go to the computer and just see what we have."
There are several websites that allow you to catalogue your collection. Marc uses CellarTracker, entering info on each new bottle of wine he buys.
You can do it alphabetically, by type, region, or date the wine was bottled. You can write tasting notes for each bottle, or read reviews from other users.
CEO Eric LeVine said you don't have to be a wine expert to enjoy the service.
"People, you know, with collections of all sizes are using the site anywhere from 20 bottles up to 20,000."
LeVine uses it when he shops for wine, taking out his phone, going online and checking out each bottle he's thinking of buying.
Barry Dorf uses another program called VinCellar to track his growing collection.
One of his favorite features is when the site tells him when it's best to open his wine.
"This is one that it says I really shouldn't drink until 2009," Dorf said.
Many wine tracking websites, like CellarTracker and VinCellar, are free for basic cataloguing services.
Some charge fees for premium services like appraisals or professional reviews.
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